The Sage Gateshead has published its spring-into-summer diary listing classical concerts by the Northern Sinfonia and visiting orchestras.

The Sage Gateshead has published its spring-into-summer diary listing classical concerts by the Northern Sinfonia and visiting orchestras.

It is the first season with Thomas Zehetmair, the Austrian violinist and conductor, as music director of the Tyneside-based professional orchestra.

In his introduction, Simon Clugston, performance programme director at The Sage Gateshead, draws particular attention to the opening concerts at Newcastle City Hall on April 10 and the Sands Centre, Carlisle, on April 11.

They feature Zehetmair (conductor and soloist) and his friend and colleague Heinz Holliger, "certainly one of the world's most celebrated oboists", according to Mr Clugston.

He goes on to describe a "brilliant programme" spanning 250 years and including the Bach Double Concerto and a work called Eisblumen written by Holliger himself.

Other season highlights include conductor Sir Roger Norrington's Eroica Experience, an exploration of Beethoven's Eroica Symphony, at Penrith Methodist Church on April 16 and the King's Hall, Newcastle University, on April 17.